


Crossroad.

by crqstalite



Series: Scream My Name [2]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: F/M, Post-DA2, Reyna Hawke - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-30
Updated: 2020-09-30
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:28:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26738131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crqstalite/pseuds/crqstalite
Summary: In the wake of a tragedy, Reyna Hawke stands at a crossroad.
Relationships: Anders/Female Hawke, Bethany Hawke & Female Hawke
Series: Scream My Name [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1946113
Kudos: 3





	Crossroad.

**Author's Note:**

> uncapitalized because, well, i wrote this pretty late in the day lol.

“are you afraid? of what lays after all of...this?” bethany’s voice. reyna tries not to jump, but inevitably, she does. her sister is no longer in her circle robes, instead dressed down with her hair tied back, “the gallows are gone, the circle is gone, meredith is dead, orsinio is dead...”

“please, bethany. for the love of _andraste_ do not panic.” reyna tries not to snap at her, but she does it anyway, picking through what things she can fit in her pack. the red scarf she’s donned around her neck comes undone, and she pulls it away roughly before shoving another shirt away, “donnic and aveline are staying here, and you’re staying with them. you’ll be perfectly safe, there’s no reason to be afraid.”

“i-” bethany hesitates, then resigns to sitting on the bed, picking at her sleeve, “i asked if _you_ were afraid, not what _i_ was going to do after all of this.”

“you know what i intend to do,” reyna yanks the suitcase out from under the bed roughly, the latches clicking open as she flicks a bandaged hand over one.

“running away from kirkwall into the night isn’t a plan, rey.” bethany responds in a nagging tone tinged with genuine concern, folding her legs on the bed, “it’s an escape route.”

“and that’s exactly what i need, whether you like it or not,” reyna responds, folding a shirt away into the bag at her side. she’s avoiding bethany’s deep brown eyes, the same ones that she knows will be crying out to keep her from leaving, or to force her to leave sooner. but reyna has made her decision, she can’t come back from this, “the templars will sniff me out soon enough. and because they can’t use me as some example of a mage gone rogue with the chantry’s brand, they’ll kill me for this.”

bethany doesn’t answer after that, and they sit in silence. she feels bad about talking to her like that, but she has to. bethany is twenty five now, she isn’t a child like when they first arrived in kirkwall. she can handle herself, should anyone give her trouble and aveline isn’t around to protect her. 

it wasn’t an option she liked, but she trusted aveline with her life -- no matter how much they squabbled before over morals and reyna’s own questionable actions towards the templars as of recently. bethany would be safer here under the protection of the guard captain than with her on the road.

“you’ve been here for two days, and you said you’d leave earlier this week.” bethany’s voice is quiet when she speaks up again, the jangle of keys in her hand when she gives them to her, “what are you waiting for?”

reyna bitterly chuckles, “are you trying to get rid of me too, dear sister?” she asks, remembering how aveline had advised the same thing to her. kirkwall was still reeling after she’d hidden out with the vallens for a bit to let it blow over long enough to trek home without suspicion. the others...they’d be safe. they couldn’t go after fenris, they wouldn’t know of his involvement and merrill and isabela would be out of town within the month on isabela’s ship. and varric?

varric always had a way out. she didn’t know how this time, everyone knew he was involved with her, but he assured her he’d find a way.

she still sat up, waiting for the cellar door to open those two nights she spent in her own home since then. and yet...it doesn’t. it remains closed, and locked.

did he wear it that night?

“no! no of course not, reyna if i could go with you--” bethany cuts herself off, a frown on her face when reyna rises from her knees, pushing the half empty case back under the bed, “you know that i would. i just...don’t want you caught. everything is so...crazy right now. why are you staying so long?”

“it doesn’t matter. i’m leaving tonight, less templars out and the guards will be able to get me out of the city before knight-captain rutherford even knows i was back in hightown.” reyna shrugs, retying the scarf around her neck. the sun was due to go down in just a bit, the sky still playing with colors of a deep pink and the black encroaching upon it. the guards would switch into their night shift soon.

“that’s...not it.” bethany follows after her as reyna throws the pack on over her shoulder, “you know that’s not what it is.”

“why are you so desperate to know?” reyna quips back, biting her lip to keep from yelling. she knows why, she knows exactly why she’s still here and not heading for the hanged man to sail with isabela. and yet..it’s still stupid to admit out loud. it’s beyond foolish, and the same thing that got her mother in trouble before she was born, “surely you don’t intend to gossip with isabela.”

“reyna...” bethany gives her a look that’s reminiscent of leandra’s, and she cringes back from it. she knows bethany is only concerned from her safety, concerned about _her_ , but she’s more concerned about her’s. and that hurts. reyna was the reason they even had to be careful, the reason bethany had to change her name and cut her hair. and yet, here she was, still caring about her foolish older sister after it all.

it infuriated and wounded her at the exact same time. bethany’s hand brushes her shoulder as she pauses at the door frame, and reyna tenses at the touch against her bicep. why why why had she done all of this? she could’ve just let meredith go on her tirade, turned a blind eye. they had such a nice cushy house here in hightown, and now the amell estate would surely be passed over to some other templar allied noble once everything was in order. they would’ve won and lost their mother’s childhood home within a decade. 

but no. she’d let her own interests blind her to the real goal. she couldn’t stay incognito long enough to let herself even enjoy it.

“reyna, please. just tell me, that way i can help. that way i can find whatever it is you’re looking for.” another beat of silence, “i know you don’t like talking about what bothers you, or makes you angry for my sake and everyone elses’ sake but sometimes people genuinely want to help you. _i_ want to help you.”

“like how meredith helped the mages?” she asks coldly, and bethany’s eyes are startled and hurt but the words keep pouring out of her mouth, “like how orsinio helped the mages? like how i -- how i helped anders? you can’t help me, bethany.”

her sister freezes, a grimace on her young face as reyna tries not to look over her shoulder before turning on her, “like how i put everything aside to stand behind him when he needed me? and i cost kirkwall their circle, their knight enchanter and their knight-commander? like how i helped kirkwall?”

“you did help!” bethany argues, reaching out to take her hand. reyna snaps it back, “you helped so many people while you were here!”

“at what cost! at what cost did i **help** everyone back in ‘34, and then lose mother to a _blood mage_? at what cost did i **help** by keeping you out of the deep roads, and then losing you to the gallows? at what cost did i **_help_** anders, and then lose the chantry because i was so goddamn blind?!”

“you weren’t blind! you wanted to help us, and you _did_. you can’t apologize for that reyna-”

“i’m not apologizing! i’ll never sodding apologize for what i believe in, but riddle me this bethany -- do you think the chantry would be a smoking _crater_ if i had said no? if i’d denied the idea that i could split anders and justice? do you think we’d have to leave if i didn’t want to help the mages so goddamn bad that i costed us our place in kirkwall?”

“that’s not your fault. you stood up for what you believed in, you stood up for me!” bethany cries, “that’s not your fault. none of it is. it’s-it’s...”

“it’s anders’. that’s what everyone says, right?” reyna runs a hand through her hair, feeling her hands begin to shake the way they do when she doesn’t feel okay, when she doesn’t feel right. her mother had always been able to calm her down but now she can barely speak.

“no. no it isn’t.” bethany avoids her gaze, “you said you believed in him. believed in what he said. believed in what was right.”

reyna throws out her hands around them, “is **_this_** what is right, bethany? templars hunting me down, everyone forced to leave because of me and him? was it right that i let what made me happy _blind_ me to what was the truth?”

“i-”

“no! it wasn’t! i can’t defend my actions, i can’t defend his. i can’t defend how i hunted templars down and then pretended to figuratively wash my hands of the blood that was spilled when the chantry came down!” she’s breathing hard, her chest tight, “i can’t defend anyone’s actions -- there was no compromise, but was any of it worth it just so i could have _one more day with him_!?”

she doesn’t know where her words have gone. but they’re not there anymore. none to pull on. nothing else to say lest she reveal why she’s still here, nothing left to say that she hasn’t already said twenty times over, nor anything she can say that won’t sound like she’s complaining about the mess she got herself into. 

bethany’s eyes glimmer with sad understanding, once she is no longer taken aback by her outburst, “you’re waiting for him. you still think he’ll come back.”

reyna is silent. she knows if she denies it, bethany will pick her apart until she falls apart.

her sister shouldn’t have to listen to her like this. shouldn’t have to pay for her mistakes.

“you believed in him at some point, you cared about him and you were happy, i know you were. and you didn’t want to stay in kirkwall even before all of this. i think the words you used were even ‘these four walls can’t hold me anymore’ the last time you visited.” bethany’s demeanor is soft compared to her own, gently pulling her gloves on, “you...i’ll stay here with you if i have to. reyna if you still love-”

“no! i don’t!” a fire burns inside her as her hands tighten into fists at her side, anger climbing up her throat to choke the words out of her, “i don’t! do you really think that-”

“would you still be here if you didn’t?”

that gives reyna pause long enough to keep from punching the wall next to her. there are holes in her room from earlier, days before bethany had managed to make it out of the shithole of the gallows through varric’s assistance. scars are still just barely healing on her knuckles, and they’re splitting open again from just how hard she’s folded her hands into balls at her side.

“no. you wouldn’t, because you care. you would’ve skipped town already if you didn’t.”

“he _used_ me, bethany. he knew what he was doing and he still did it! would someone who loved someone else really do something like that, without their conscience betraying them?” reyna walks further away from her sister, making to descend down the stairs, “would he still give me all that goddamn praise for what i was doing for the mages in the circle if he really loved me?”

“reyna, you’re not even thinking anymore. of course he loved you-”

“how would you know!” at the bottom of the stairs, reyna whirls on her sister, a fearful look in her matching pair of dark eyes before she even registers it, “how would you know bethany? nobody knew, absolutely no one knew not even me! i’m supposed to be the bloody champion of kirkwall and instead i kept an apostate in my home for upwards of three years, and assisted with destroying the chantry at the same time! all because i thought he cared about me, and i just ignored all the warning signs! i should’ve known, i should’ve said something -- said anything and yet i **didn’t** because i couldn’t! i was _weak_ and i’m paying the price for it now!”

her eyes sting with unshed tears, frustration taking precedent and building up in her tightening throat, “if he really cared about me, he would’ve told me! that’s what we did, that’s what we always did! i was willing to risk my neck for karl, i was willing to help get a group of apostates out for him, ‘oh hawke is always ready to help’, sodding irresponsibly stupid old me, right?”

“you’re not stupid, you’re _not_ stupid reyna.” bethany bypasses the near shove she gives her sister and instead wraps her arms around her waist, holding tight, “you loved him. you did. i know what losing carver and losing mother did to you. and i know i couldn’t be here for you. i wish i could’ve been. to help you through all of it but i couldn’t. i trusted anders to stay with you, i trusted him to keep you grounded. you weren’t weak. you were stronger than any of us.”

reyna is shaking, her hands stuck at her sides as bethany buries her head in her shoulder. she’s hurt, she’s very hurt by all of this, feeling like she’s been stabbed twenty times over with her own blades when anders had admitted to the crime with a resigned tone of voice, sitting hunched over away from her. expecting death, surprised she did not grant it even at the cost of fenris’ trust. she was aware nothing would change if they didn’t do anything drastic, she’s not wounded by that. she’s destroyed on the inside because he didn’t tell her. 

she trusted him with every part of her. told him things that no one would ever hear come from her lips. things she hadn’t even told herself before. they had each other’s backs for years, and that was where the line of trust snapped.

where did she go wrong? 

was this her fault? because she’d come off as too much? would he have told her if she pressed him for why his demeanor had changed instead of dealing with everyone else’s problems?

she thought she’d meant everything to him. neither of them had anyone left but each other. he’d been there when her mother died, had consoled her to the best of his ability when bethany had been taken. 

and yet?

and yet that still wasn’t enough. it wasn’t enough to trust her. it wasn’t enough to let her say ‘i trust you, and i’m with you’.

love is a strong word for someone who immediately lost all claim on it regarding her. 

but?

she would lie if she said there was nothing left for him to possibly reclaim someday. a long time from now, maybe a lifetime.

but not never.

“he did one shitty job of it.” she chuckles darkly, resigning to put her arms around her sister. knowing that this will be one of the few times she even gets the chance in the next few days, weeks, months and maybe even years, carefully as she chokes out her name, “bethany.”

“yes, sister?” 

“i don’t...i don’t think he’s coming home.” that breaks a part of her inside, blinking a few times up at the dark ceiling to keep herself from falling apart completely -- why was her sister even still here? she had bigger things to worry about than her washed up older sister, the ex-champion of kirkwall, “as much as i might wish it, i don’t think he will be.” 

“he told you he loved him in the gallows, right before orsinio went mad, you know. he was terrified, he was focused exclusively on keeping you alive when we fought meredith. i don’t think i ever caught him with his eyes off of you.” bethany says, gently untangling herself, “maybe it’s not worth atonement in your eyes. i’m not sure. but...” her eyes dart to where the hall ends and the cellar begins a turn later, “maybe he will come back to you.”

does he deserve her forgiveness for that? at all? just because he still loved her before then? because he’d looked her in the eyes, the corners of them crinkling with a look of adoration, of sadness, and had promised her a world where it wouldn’t matter if they were together? how undeniably warm his hands had felt in her’s when their fingers curled together shortly before the ensuing fight against the templars?

she doesn’t know.

she’s so angry that she genuinely wants to hit something. wants to yell at someone, anything. sit someone down and explain why there is a wildfire burning her soul from the inside out, why she so desperately just wants this all to end. wake up from the nightmare that has plagued her for days. will most likely haunt her for the rest of her life.

but she’s also hurt. so makerdamned hurt. where did the trust even go, did it run off or was it never there to begin with? was it worth destroying herself again, on the run with surely thedas’ most wanted mage only because she _thought_ he cared for her?

is that what she wants? or was that decision already made for her? 

was it foolish? was it foolish to wait and wait and wait even though she knows the chances of him coming back are slim?

she’d understood -- had said that she knew they’d never be like any normal couple. that she’d have to run, because apostates would never be free. and yet, she’d taken the plunge. had accepted her fate.

all reyna can say is, “i don’t know.”

bethany nods, playing with the deep black curls their mother had given her, before stepping past her, “it’s dark out now. i can’t stay here any longer, sister. donnic will get worried and come out looking for me.”

“i-i know.” reyna responds, squeezing her eyes shut and shaking out the limp curls in her hair from the braid she’d worn earlier, bethany padding closer to the door and pulling her heavy cloak off of the hook, “bethany--be careful.”

“i will. i promise.” bethany says, “as long as you do as well. they will not be friendly to you on the road. anders may not have a phylactery but-”

“they know what he looks like. i know that. that’s to say he even comes by later, though,” reyna takes a breath, trying not to antagonize her sister, “but i will.”

bethany waves, a sad smile on her face before the large door closes, the sound reverberating through the foyer. her calming presence is gone, and reyna feels the cold beginning to seep in her. now that bethany has left, she doesn’t have to pretend she’s okay to keep her sister from worrying more than she already has done. she sadly chuckles, bethany had gotten that from their mother -- a worried hen for all her chicks.

that was _supposed_ to be reyna, watching over her sister. keeping her safe from the templars, keeping her alive. bethany wasn’t supposed to have to come to the estate just to check on her. but she’d been so busy trying to change something that had weathered the pattern of time that she’d neglected everything else. her friends, her family.

herself.

the fire warms her bones to the best of it’s meager ability, her hands regaining feeling. it was a cold night out, she’d have to wear one of her thicker cloaks when she finally left.

this wasn’t how it was supposed to end. and yet here she was, spending the last night in her family home. she says an apology to her mother under her breath, an apology to gamlen even, an apology to her grandparents, an apology to bethany, to carver, to her father. 

she’d failed every single one of them.

reyna doesn’t break down. she knows if she does, she won’t ever leave. she’ll just stay here and be sad and cry about the things she can’t control. and she doesn’t have time for that.

she’s supposed to be the strong one. she can’t be that if she’s bawling like a baby.

inevitably, she spends another two hours in the estate, bordering three and eyes barely open while she stokes the fire every few go arounds. she’s ready to leave, bag over her shoulders and conscience weighing down on her like a brick. but she wanders the house instead, listlessly and without a true purpose.

admiring everything they’d _earned_ after so many years. brushing a hand against her mother’s portrait when she stops in the main hall just outside the room that has been locked since her death. the same brown eyes they all shared staring back at her, a small smile that reyna wants to see again. there’s a smaller one of carver she’d had commissioned years ago with her first allowance from the expedition, and it sits next to her’s. she was supposed to have bethany, father and herself done at some point. a family of portraits once they’d properly settled into the estate.

and then she’d gotten busy, and never finished the task.

she hates to say that she used to wonder if she’d get anders done as well, if they ever solidified what they used to have. she pulls her eyes away from the younger leandra, descending the steps again and making sure all the doors are locked. donnic and aveline are the only two with keys to the estate besides anders and bethany. she would not let the templars have her home if she still had any say about it.

she’s near the front door, cloak donned dutifully around her shoulders and gloves donned, daggers hidden in sheathes on her thighs when she hears the distant sound of a door open and close. her whole body freezes, fearful that it’s an intruder. a templar maybe, they’d found the secret entrance to the cellar under the house. it wouldn’t be the first time, and she should’ve known it wouldn’t be the last. of course it would be the day that she intends to leave.

seizing, she pulls her daggers out, gripping the handles with shaky hands before pushing herself up against the wall leading down the hall. she’d left the door open, what a foolish mistake.

boots. the sound of boots against the carpet. quiet, soft. they aren’t trying to announce their presence, but she doesn’t want to take the risk to look over her shoulder into the inky darkness. she recognizes everyone’s footfalls. she had to, that was part of her training while she lived in lothering and it had saved her life more than a few times since she’d moved to kirkwall.

and terrifyingly-

-she recognizes these. the ones that accompany a long night in the clinic, ones that accompany a proper hunt in the city for mages to help escape.

a quiet voice.

a tired voice.

a resigned voice, calling out for her in a way that shatters her before he steps into the light of the fire, “hawke?”

after a moment, she falls apart. tears bubbling up in her eyes as she turns the corner from where she’d pressed herself up against the wall in preparation.

a staff that isn’t quite regulation, and the black robes she was sure were still stained with blood from a week prior.

the amber eyes she couldn’t say no to, hands that had been tangled with her’s only weeks ago.

“anders.”

he doesn’t look well. not at all. exhausted, eye bags looking darker than they had since he’d moved in with her. hair tied back hurriedly, his own robes barely tied properly.

but, there’s a cloak around his shoulders, straps from a pack as well. dark black to surely hide himself from the templars that are swarming darktown like flies on fruit. she doesn’t ignore that it’s the same one she’d given him two years ago in the dead of winter, worn, but she still recognizes the hawke crest over his heart. clear as day, and worn proudly.

or it had been, when it had been given when he’d first moved in and leandra had suggested the gift, as they and bethany both owned one. her mother had even bothered her to get his name stitched in beneath the crest, though she didn’t. 

she’s glad, she’s not sure if she could take that. not now.

“you’re here,” she responds, biting her tongue not to launch into something she’ll regret, “then you still have the key.”

“you gave me it. i would not simply lose something so important,” that grits against her nerves in a way she can’t explain, though he hesitates to step forward towards her, “you are free to have it back, as i suppose you’re leaving the city according to varric.”

“is this not also your home?” she asks bitterly, forgoing the fact she’d said not to tell anders when she was leaving, “or did you forget somehow in the last few months?”

reyna feels childish when she notes he doesn’t even seem angered by the accusation, just...sad. not the sort of sad where he’s begging for forgiveness at her feet and trying to guilt trip him, but the kind of sad one can only have when they’ve reached rock bottom.

“what do you want me to say, re-hawke?” and yet again, there is no anger behind the words. no deep seated frustration. reyna doesn’t know how to respond to someone who isn’t yelling at her for some reason or the other. she can deal with anger, she can yell at anger rightfully. apologetic...she doesn’t know what to do with apologetic, “if you wish for me to go, then i will. i won’t force myself where i am not wanted.”

she can’t bite them back fast enough, “you betrayed my trust, anders. you took away my right to choose when you lied to me for why you needed all of those ingredients.”

“i know.” is all he offers.

“i know?” she parrots back to him, “if you knew, if you bloody well knew then why even bother? why even accept that sodding key, why stay here? you can’t hide behind the excuse that you knew you would hurt me in the end. there must have been a part of you that knew this wouldn’t end well for you, for _us_.

“was there ever an _us_ , anders?”

“yes!” something in him snaps before he pulls himself back together, “there _always_ was, reyna. there always was, and that was never in question.”

the question is on the tip of her tongue, but she knows she will never get a proper answer. not one she doesn’t already know, “you thought i wouldn’t support you in this, so you didn’t even take the chance.”

“admit it, you wouldn’t have. no one we know would’ve. and i do not blame you.” anders nearly chastises her, “i could not take that chance to drag you into this. it would be my burden to bear.”

“i am not a child, anders.”

“i know.”

“then you would’ve known that i would at least hear you out. that i would’ve listened. that you didn’t have to play this game of secrecy with me,” she will not beg for an answer if that isn’t what he intends to give her. she is not pathetic.

“you would’ve stopped me. this was something i had to do.”

“would i have? i supported you everywhere else. nearly got myself killed for you. was that not enough to solidify that i was yours, that i would always be with you no matter what?”

when she can not find anymore words, pointedly looking at him instead, he slips the twine that the key hung on from around his neck. worn, but obviously well taken care of. it’s not even scratched upon further inspection. he holds it out her, in a similar fashion that she had given it to him earlier this year. twinkling in the dying light of the fire, spinning gently in a circle, “tell me to go, reyna.”

she hates the way he says it. as if he has already accepted that she will kick him out properly this time. how her name doesn’t sound like sugar on one’s tongue, it instead sounds like the salty tears that had poured down her cheeks for days after the chantry incident. thinly veiled frustration, barely veiled sadness.

she _could_ tell him to go now. there’s nothing keeping her from doing so. it would be significantly easier if she did, in fact. travelling lighter, and she didn’t have to watch for templars nearly as often because an apostate wouldn’t be with her. she could support herself. she was not helpless.

it’d be that easy. just a few words, and she’d be free to leave this cursed city.

_then **go** , anders. i don’t want you here anymore. you’ve destroyed what we had in favor of forwarding your own political agenda. you used me! you used my trust to do all of this, and now you have the audacity to come back and give me my own key back like you actually care what i think of you? you used my love for you. you twisted and tore us apart to something unfathomable. you have no right to be here. this is not your home any longer._

a fire roaring. intoxicated with adrenaline, wandering hands. happy looks, the roll of one’s eyes at another’s antics. the feeling of being a pair, the emotions she could never replicate with another.

_he used me!_

the warmest look in amber eyes as their lips fit together, tasting of lyrium and metallic blood.

her hand is shaking just out of the corner of her eye, she can grasp it now. it’s warm as she takes it from his hand. carefully. slowly. the twine has nearly frayed in so many places, yet knotted together again and again with dexterous hands she could only credit to him.

she knows what she has to do. the fire inside blazes and she opens her mouth to speak, setting her face. this isn’t something she should just back down from.

yet...

the words don’t come. 

they fail her. 

instead of anything else, even managing a curse or two, she moves her other hand to take his, pressing the key firmly back into his palm, curling his fingers back over it. inhaling, she wonders if she’s making the right decision. is this worth it? should she even begin to take the chance? the chance she could never have another life, never rebuild what she once had?

is it worth it to try and rebuild the shattered pieces in front of her, the scars reopening and bleeding from when it had first broken?

she remembers a vase she and her siblings had broken as children -- her mother’s in fact. blue, glittering in the dying sunlight of the evening when it had broken.

chipped. but not beyond recognition. the bigger pieces were still intact. it was glued back together with the help of their father before their mother was any the wiser.

it will hurt to put the glass back together if she chooses to pick them back up.

exhaling, she finally looks up at him. thinly veiled shock, surprise greets her instead in his expression, “don’t.” is all she can say, lest she actually let her emotions get the better of her.

reyna knows the wish that she could be alone on the road was real, was tangible. but she can’t. not after losing her father, losing carver, losing bethany, losing her mother, slowly losing the people around her to her own mind. not now. not when she knows that she still cares about him. not when there is one person left in the world like hum.

“reyna, i don’t deserve this. you know that much better than i do.” he tries to give it back to her, but she only clutches his hand tighter.

“keep it.” she nearly orders before softening her tone, “please.”

he considers his words, “if..you wish.”

reyna is quiet again. then she is really doing this, a wave of sadness passing over her. she is leaving, with the one person that caused the need to. but the person that she still has fractured trust from, the person that was her first, and if she let’s this progress, her last.

“i will not try to explain it again. you know my reasoning, reyna. and i am truly sorry for the pain i have caused you,” he admits quietly, “i can say a million things, but you would still find faults. and i can never truly apologize for what happened.”

“you can’t,” she agrees, wrapping her cloak around her lithe figure tighter, “you’re right on that front.”

he’s not phased by her response, “i am not asking to be taken back. i know i have foolishly thrown away what we had.”

“again, you _are_ correct,” she rubs the fabric in between her gloved fingers. she hesitates again, knowing what she says now will make or break whatever this is, “but. why are you here then? if you know?”

“i...was not going to ask to travel with you, but to say goodbye. i was unsure if you wanted to see me, or if you were even still here to be entirely honest, but i wished to try,” he pauses, “i will always care for you, reyna. even if it is no longer reciprocated.”

and that is it. it sounds terribly final, as if he is ready to leave right that very moment. he has not made another advance towards her, but his eyes crinkle into a sad smile. one that is all too reminiscent of the same received that fateful day she’d first met him.

a rush of anxiety takes her heart hostage before she speaks again, turning over her shoulder to walk towards the door. she can’t face him when she’s on the brink of a breakdown, “you always did assume so much, anders.” reyna muses.

she doesn’t watch his reaction, but she can hear him walking ever closer, the sound of his staff dragging along the ground doing nothing to hide his presence from her, “will i see you again?” he asks hurriedly.

another blink. another halt of her thought process.

she can’t do this. she was supposed to be strong. but she isn’t. he’s too much to her, he’s _been_ too much to her. how much he gave her, material and emotionally. she’s not ready to rip that away.

it wouldn’t be the same.

everything is still much too raw. too painful to touch. but no one said she had to touch an open would right then, in that very moment. another time, when it was easier to treat. allowed time to heal.

“it would be a crime if you did not,” she puts a hand on the knob, cold through her gloves. it’s nearly entirely dark, now that the fire is gone and the moonlight is shining through the window to illuminate the room, glinting off the steel of hids staff, “tell me, anders.”

“anything.” he answers, careful, calculating. gauging her reaction.

“can--” she turns over her shoulder, tears building in her eyes as she awaits his response, “can you still give me a world like the one you described in the gallows?”

he’s rendered speechless for once. then, recognition flashes through his eyes, as if he is remembering exactly what she is talking about. then, a nod, “i can surely try, if you allow me the pleasure.”

reyna pulls her hood up over head. considering, overthinking at this point, before taking his hand with her free one. this would not be perfect, far from it. she still has anger boiling just underneath the surface. they will both be hunted, unless they should leave the free marches. she is signing away any chance at a normal life.

she squeezes his fingers in her’s tentatively, “then let us find it, yes?”


End file.
